Chapter 4

They took me down to a windowless holding room in the basement security office, the kind of place the Institute used for people suspected of stealing research or selling secrets to competitors.

"Let me go. I'm Dr. Penrose's student."

The head of security sneered. "The only student Dr. Penrose has ever publicly acknowledged is Garrett Vance. And now some woman from a nowhere town thinks she can pass herself off as his student?"

The door swung open. Blair walked in with a sealed folder. "Captain, we found this sewn into the lining of her coat."

It was an early draft of my Regenesis report, which I had brought along for reference.

The captain's face grew grimmer with every page. It was missing the final revisions, but it held detailed experimental data and a fully developed theoretical model. It was obviously part of a core project that hadn't been released yet.

Garrett's eyes flashed with shock. He recognized the conclusions in that report. In our last life, this was the work that had carried him to the top. But he only remembered the results, not the experiments behind them, and if this report went public now, everything he had built over the past five years would fall apart.

"That's the project I'm presenting tonight," I said. "If you don't believe me, call Dr. Penrose."

Garrett objected right away. "My mentor is getting ready for the symposium. There's no reason to bother him over a suspected thief."

The captain didn't dare handle research this important carelessly, so he made the call anyway.

"Dr. Penrose, is there a newcomer scheduled to present a new direction in toxin research tonight?"

"There's no newcomer," Walter said, and hung up.

I understood at once. He had told the truth. I'd worked in regenerative research for nearly ten years, so I was no newcomer, and the project had to stay completely confidential until its official announcement. Walter would never share it with a caller he couldn't identify.

Blair smiled. "You heard him. Dr. Penrose denied it himself."

"Call him again and give him my name."

"We've wasted enough time." The captain pulled a black hood over my head. "Tell us which competitor sent you. Confess now, and you can spare yourself some pain."

I made myself stay calm. "No one sent me. I'm a researcher at this Institute, and that report is mine."

Garrett's voice came coldly from somewhere close by. "No one at the Institute has ever seen you. You're just a woman I turned down. What right do you have to be in this building?"

"You haven't opened a formal investigation. You have no authority to put a hand on me."

The captain paused, then burst out laughing. "A spy wants to lecture me about procedure? If we get the name of a rival lab out of you, you'll have handed me the biggest win of my career."

The administrator chimed in, suddenly interested. "If we crack a case of corporate espionage, would that count toward my promotion?"

Garrett and Blair clearly had no intention of letting me walk out of there in one piece. The cuffs bit deeper into my wrists, and they tried to force me to confess that I worked for a rival lab that didn't exist.

The captain knocked me to the floor. I tasted blood, but when he demanded a confession, I gave him the same answer. "Call Dr. Penrose. Give him my name."

"Garrett..." I struggled to push myself up. "If you don't want your whole career destroyed, make them stop."

Blair grabbed a fistful of my hair and yanked my face upward. "I told you you wouldn't get out of here today." She leaned in close enough that only I could hear her. "You have to be ruined, Margot. Only when you've disappeared completely will there be no one left to destroy my happiness."

Someone knocked urgently at the door.

"The symposium has started. Dr. Penrose is looking for someone. Everyone involved is needed in the main hall right now!"

Garrett straightened his suit and gave a cold order. "Bring the spy out."

In the main hall, Walter stood at the lectern, demanding to know why the staff still hadn't found me.

The side door burst open. They threw me onto the floor in front of the stage, the black hood still over my face, my wrists cuffed behind me.

Garrett held up my report and addressed Walter in a grave voice. "Dr. Penrose, we caught a woman trying to steal classified research from the Institute and sell it to a competitor. The evidence is right here."